The Investigative Journal Appoints Award-winning Canadian Journalist and Author Mohamed Fahmy as CEO
VANCOUVER, British Columbia, May 10, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- The Investigative Journal (www.InvestigativeJournal.org), a newly launched online investigative news platform, has appointed Canadian-Egyptian journalist and author Mohamed Fahmy as its chief executive officer. The London-based web publication offers a platform for in-depth long-form investigative journalism.
"I see no better time to work with the world's investigative journalists on stories often overlooked by the mainstream media," said Fahmy from the Vancouver office of The Investigative Journal. "We're living in an age of unprecedented attacks on journalists, with 80 colleagues murdered and 348 imprisoned in 2018 alone."
Since its initial inception in February, the journal has published reports by prominent journalists from around the world, including three-time New York Times bestselling author and journalist, Richard Miniter, and Turkish journalist Abdullah Bozkurt. Miniter exposed an unprecedented cyber-espionage operation by the Qatari government, while Bozkurt uncovered wiretaps exposing the Turkish government's collusion with ISIS to smuggle tens of thousands of foreign and Turkish militants across the Turkish border to fight in Syria.
The Investigative Journal's editor-in-chief, writer and seasoned editor Jane Cahane, says the journal's mission is to shine a light on the most pressing issues affecting our world today. These include climate change, the attack on press freedoms, terrorism, corporate corruption, cyber-crime, refugees, and human rights abuse and migration.
The journal's publisher is Yousri Ishaq, a British philanthropist and architect with a background in journalism. "We want to provide a platform for experienced journalists and whistle-blowers to tell the stories no-one else is telling," said Ishaq. "We want to ensure our readers receive diverse content from a variety of voices and perspectives."
Among the board of advisers is Lindsey Snell, an American investigative and video journalist and winner of the Edward R. Murrow award; Abdullah Bozkurt, a Sweden-based journalist who served in Turkey's capital, Ankara, for years as bureau chief for Turkey's former largest English daily, Today's Zaman, which was seized by the Turkish government; Richard Miniter who wrote a column on national security in Forbes magazine for seven years, and award-winning Pakistani journalist Taha Siddiqui, who continues to write from exile in France after surviving an abduction on the hands of the military in Pakistan.
The Investigative Journal also produces original video content, featuring interviews with journalists about their investigations. Under the direction of Christopher Bennett, the former Executive Producer of TEDx Vancouver and the current Executive Producer and Head of Marketing at Vancouver's Film School. TIJ is planning to produce hard-hitting investigative documentary films in partnership with Canadian-based Ensan Films.
"Five journalists on our advisory board have been prosecuted, jailed, or abducted while doing their jobs," Fahmy said. "It's their determination to continue reporting from exile and in the face of real threat that inspired me to join TIJ. I hope their work will inspire our readers the same way."
ABOUT THE INVESTIGATIVE JOURNAL:
www.investigativejournal.org
Founded in 2018, The Investigative Journal (TIJ) conducts in-depth research, timely analysis and original journalism to promote human rights causes, and the fundamentals of democracy. The content of the published videos and investigations on the TIJ site are provided through open-source research, analysis, and first-hand field investigations prepared by experts, scholars, award-winning investigative journalists and filmmakers from various countries and backgrounds. The journal has offices in London, UK, with affiliates in Vancouver, Canada and Washington, DC.
About Mohamed Fahmy
www.FahmyFoundation.org
Mohamed Fadel Fahmy is an Egyptian-Canadian award-winning journalist and author. Fahmy has worked extensively in the Middle East, mostly for CNN. He covered the Iraq War in 2003 for the Los Angeles Times and entered Iraq on the first day of the war. Upon completion of his one-year mission, he authored his first book, Baghdad Bound.
In 2007 he completed a one-year mission with the International Committee of the Red Cross, protecting the rights of political prisoners, the missing, and refugees in Beirut-Lebanon.
In 2011 he won the Peabody award with the CNN team for their reporting of the Arab Spring. The following year he won the Tom Renner investigative reporting award for producing the documentary Death in the Desert. The film was part of the CNN Freedom Project series that exposed the organized crime rings operating the illegal human trafficking of Sub-Saharan Africans to Israel through Sinai-Egypt.
He co-authored Egyptian Freedom Story, a photo documentary of the January 25 revolution of 2011. In September 2013, he accepted a new post as the Al Jazeera English Egypt Bureau Chief. Three months into the job, he was jailed with two colleagues for 438 days and unjustly accused of belonging to the Muslim Brotherhood group designated as terrorists and for allegedly fabricating news. He was pardoned in 2015 with the help of prominent British lawyer Amal Clooney. Upon his arrival to Vancouver, Mohamed Fahmy accepted a job offered to him while he was still in prison, as an adjunct professor at the University of British Columbia and wrote a column for the Toronto Star.
In 2015, Mohamed co-founded the Fahmy Foundation for Free Press to help journalists imprisoned worldwide, and he is currently a member of the Board of Directors for Canadian Journalists for Freedom of Expression. His new book The Marriott Cell, documenting his wrongful incarceration in Egypt for 438 days was published in Canada.
Mohamed is the recipient of numerous awards, including:
-The Peabody Award with the CNN team for coverage of the Arab Spring
-Tom Renner Investigative Reporting Award (2012)
-The Royal Television Society Journalism Judges' Award
-Freedom of Speech Award (International Association of Press Clubs)
-Freedom to Read Award (Writers' Union of Canada),
-Canadian Commission World Press Freedom Award & UNESCO,
-BC Civil Liberties Award for Human Rights
SOURCE The Investigative Journal
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